


Breaking the Silence.

by Aproclivity



Category: The Black Tapes Podcast
Genre: F/M, Psychic Richard Strand, it's the end of the world as we know it and nothing's fine, this is very angsty
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-16
Updated: 2020-02-16
Packaged: 2021-02-28 03:53:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,100
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22757341
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aproclivity/pseuds/Aproclivity
Summary: After the world ends, Alex Reagan and Richard Strand are holed up in a cabin. It's been three days and Alex hasn't slept, so Richard sings her to sleep.
Relationships: Alex Reagan/Richard Strand
Comments: 15
Kudos: 21





	Breaking the Silence.

**Author's Note:**

  * For [nerdyvixen](https://archiveofourown.org/users/nerdyvixen/gifts).



> So my wife wanted a fic where Richard sings Alex to sleep after seeing the tweet Paul Bae made about Christian Sloan singing him to sleep while Paul was drunk so here we are. Unfortunately my finger slipped and now we have some angst. I may play in this verse a bit more eventually but for now this is just what it is.

Alex had never really bought into all of that stuff about the world ending with a whimper and not a bang. After all, what was their apocalypse made of if it wasn’t “harmful sounds?” The Unsound, The Mysterium (even if she had lied to throw the Cenophus off their track in that last episode before they went off the books) all of it, all of it had to do with sound. Her business in a way was sound! But still Warren had ended the world with a whimper. Maybe she should apologize to Eliot, but Alex didn’t like his poetry anyway, not since her well meaning grandmother had dragged her to _Cats_ for her birthday when she was ten. 

Perfectly good waste of a tenth birthday, that was. 

“Alex,” Richard’s voice was soft next to her, as if he worried about startling her like she was a bird or something. He’d been handling her with kid gloves since he’d picked her up from the ground in Geneva. Because of course they were going to Geneva. He’d been treating Alex like she was going to break or like she was a bomb since Warren had… well, since he had revealed everything. Maybe she was a bomb now, considering this was all her fault. But Alex still doesn’t like being treated like she was fragile. Turning towards him was difficult with the bandage on her middle and with her arm strapped to her chest, but she does it anyway. “It’s been three days. You need to sleep.”

“I’ve been _trying_!” The words are an angry protest and she tries not to notice how he flinches at them in the safe house that Simon had brought them too. It wasn’t much of a safe house, and Alex has had her fill of cabins to last her a lifetime but they haven’t been able to get out of the mountains, so this is where they were. Most of the time Alex tries to ignore how the snow magnifies all the unnatural sounds around them, but when she’d gotten too close to Warren’s machine it had shorted out her phone so bye bye white noise app. At least they still had her recorder. Somewhere. Alex doesn’t want to ask about it, because she can’t handle the pitying look on his face that he gave her last time. It makes her want to punch him like she punched her fa--like Warren and she doesn’t want to do that to him, because she loves him. Even if she doesn’t know if he actually loves her, or if she was just the perfect bait like Warren said. 

But he traces the hair from her face like he had since she’d gotten back from Turkey, like he did when he’d forgotten that she was recording and mentioned going to Geneva for the conference he was scheduled to speak at. Richard always loved pushing the hair back from her face, because he’d wanted to for three years and had never allowed himself to touch her. He’d whispered that to her the first time that they had made love, and it had made her grin. Alex’s smile is softer now, but she does give one to Richard before she just says gently: “I’m sorry, it’s not you.” 

“I know it’s not, Alex. It’s this. All of this.” Richard just gestures broadly to the closeness of the cabin where he had dragged the mattress onto the floor in front of the fireplace because she was so cold. She’s still cold, even though she knows that she feels warm. But the cold dark places of the sea live within her now, and Alex isn’t at all sure how to make them go away. If they ever will. It’s like Richard knows what she’s thinking (no, she corrects, he does know what she’s thinking because all of the walls and scabs and scars have been ripped away) “but we’re going to fix it. We’re going to fix it.” Alex wants to believe that too, and she just sighs softly. 

“I’m so tired,” the words come quickly, and Alex just sighs. “I’m so tired, Richard.” 

Pressing his lips to her forehead, he just sighs. “I know, Alex. And things will feel better when you sleep. Even if I’m not a white noise app. Though I have been compared to such more than once in my teaching evaluations.” 

That makes Alex laugh, and it hurts but it’s a good hurt. “Really? Considering how many people told me that they would listen to the dictionary…”

“It was a 101 class. I might as well have been. I’d offer to read you one now, but I’m afraid we’re fresh out of dictionaries here.” And any other books. Or electricity. It’s probably a good thing that Alex is injured or they’d be driving each other nuts from the boredom. But that doesn’t matter, for now Alex just lays on his chest as best as she can with her arm and stomach not touching him and sighs softly. 

His fingers tangle through her hair for a long moment and neither of them say anything. It’s not until Alex damned near jumps out of her skin when she hears the scream of a demon close by them (well, probably not close by them really. Considering the distance and the stillness of the mountains.) that either of them opens their mouths. Richard just carefully draws her back down to a lying position before he hushes her softly. 

And then he slowly starts to sing, “ _Wise men say, only fools rush in. But I can’t help falling in love with you._ ” Alex just smiles, and she doesn’t say anything, but she knows that Richard knows that the racing of her thoughts had stopped. So, he continues. “ _Oh shall I stay? Would it be a sin? Oh if I can’t help falling in love with you._ ” Alex just sighs and presses her lips gently to the side of his neck as he moves onto the next verse. “ _Like the river flows, surely to the sea,_ ” both of them wince at the word, but Richard just kisses her forehead reassuringly before he goes on. 

“ _Darling so it goes, some things were meant to be. Take my hand. Take my whole life too. For I can’t help falling in love with you._ ” By the time he starts the song over, Alex is asleep really asleep for the first time in three days and he just holds her tightly before falling asleep himself. 

They’ll fix it. They just need time and something to break the silence.

**Author's Note:**

> Comments and kudos give me life!


End file.
